SONG OF THE CLOUDS (from "The Clouds")
by: Aristophanes
- LOUD-MAIDENS
that float on forever,
- Dew-sprinkled, fleet bodies, and fair,
- Let us rise from our Sire's loud river,
- Great Ocean, and soar through the air
- To the peaks of the pine-covered mountains where the pines
hang as tressed of hair.
- Let us seek the watch towers undaunted,
- Where the well-watered cornfields abound,
- And through murmurs of rivers nymph-haunted,
- The songs of the sea-waves resound;
- And the sun in the sky never wearies of spreading his radiance
around.
-
- Let us cast off the haze
- Of the mists from our band,
- Till with far-seeing gaze
- We may look on the land.
-
- Cloud-maidens that bring the rain shower,
- To the Pallas-loved land let us wing,
- To the land of stout heroes and Power,
- Where Kekrops was hero and king,
- Where honor and silence is given
- To the mysteries that none may declare,
- Where are gifts to the high gods in heaven
- When the house of the gods is laid bare,
- Where are lofty roofed temples, and statues well carven and
fair;
- Where are feasts to the happy immortals
- When the sacred procession draws near,
- Where garlands make bright the bright portals
- At all seasons and months in the year;
- And when spring days are here,
- Then we tread to the wine-god a measure,
- In Bacchanal dance and in pleasure,
- 'Mid the contests of sweet singing choirs,
- And the crash of loud lyres.
This English translation, by Oscar
Wilde, of 'Song of the Clouds' is reprinted from Greek Poets
in English Verse. Ed. William Hyde Appleton. Cambridge: The
Riverside Press, 1893. |
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